About a year ago, having collected all those poems and verses which I
considered of any value, I took a certain pride in the thought that I
might soon bring under one roof these imaginary children of mine, so
that they might be sheltered in time of storm, as it were, from the
cold, and oftimes unfeeling world of commerce but where friends of
poetry, who had met with some of my stray children of verse in public
journals, might meet with them again, if they desired, with other
friendly faces around one common fireside.
But I found that the expense incident to such a venture was so great
that unless a large number of copies were sold I would be involved in a
larger debt than I cared to contract. Then the plan of securing
sufficient advance subscriptions to meet part of the expense of a first
edition occurred to me, thereby following the method of Tennyson, Robert
Burns and others, of whose example I needed not to be ashamed, but other
work prevented me, and still prevents me, from carrying out this plan.
So lest those friends who have shown an interest in my verses should
think that I have turned aside from the Path of Poetry, I herewith offer
"The Calendar and Other Verses," as evidence of my love for and interest
in the greatest of all the arts, hoping that the time may come when I
shall be able to present a more worthy offering to the Muses and perhaps
justify the kind words that have recently appeared in regards to the
author of "The Quiet Life"--A Plain Poem of the Hills, which, in a
revised form, appeared serially during the past summer in The Wayne
Countean.